Single-Family Housing Starts Remain Flat in April as Manufactured Home Shipments Show Nominal Increases

National Association of Home Builders attributes leveling off to high interest rates and low confidence

According to a report by National Mortgage Professional, single-family housing starts lagged behind overall housing starts in April due to higher interest rates and lower builder sentiment, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).

While the U.S. Census Bureau reported overall, single-family and multi-family housing starts increased 5.7% in April to a seasonally adjusted rate of 1.36 million units, single-family starts remained flat in April.

This marks the consecutive month of declining single-family housing starts, as March saw a 12.4% drop from February, before revisions

As of this month (May) builder confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes is even lower, dropping six points from April, the NAHB reported Thursday.

Meanwhile, manufactured housing has continued to weather the economic negatives that have plagued the single family site-built homes, i.e, unprecedented inflation and high interest rates. However, we have seen recent nominal shipment and production increases that may be indicators that perhaps improvements may be forthcoming.

According to the Manufactured Home Institute (MHI), new manufactured homes produced and shipped through March 2024 would indicate that manufactured home shipments are outpacing site-built home percentage of starts into the first quarter of 2024. Note the following indicators.

In March 2024, 8,464 new manufactured homes were shipped, an increase of 117 homes or 1.4% compared to February 2024, an increase of 799 homes or 10.4% compared to March 2023.

According to production and shipment statistics there are indicators that manufactured home production and shipments are increasing month over month thus far in 2024.

New Homes produced* 2024 year to date – 24,227

Change from February 2024 Up 1.1%

Change from March 2023 Up 10.5%

*Note: the difference between homes produced and homes shipped is attributed to the number of homes that have been produced, but their destinations are bending.